What to See in Xian, China

Xi’an, a city drenched in history and culture dates back to one million years ago which there were 13 dynasties had established their capital cities here from the 11th century Before Christ to the Tang Dynasty (618-907A.D.). And occupying the prime central location in China, it is dotted with the most mysterious and the mind-blowing tourist attractions in the country. The most distinguishing feature of Xi’an is that it has retained its ancient heritage and culture of the bygone era. Despite its rampant modernization now, traveling in Xi’an, you will unveil the stock of surprises at these places:

Shaanxi Provincial History Museum
The newly-built Shaanxi Provincial History Museum sits on the north-west of the Big Wild Goose Pagoda in Xi’an southern suburb. In this state-level museum, the essential cultural relics of tracing back from the Lantian (a county in Shaanxi) pithecanthrope of the prehistory to the different Chinese dynasties and to the First Sino-British Opium War (1840–1842) are exhibited in the Local History Hall. This hall covers an area of 6000sq.m, including two stories centrally located in the museum. In the west side within the museum is the Theme Exhibition Hall covering 2500sq.m, where shows the special themes with Shaanxi historical and cultural features such as the Silk Road, Yaozhou Porcelain etc. The opposite of the Theme Exhibition Hall is the Historical and Cultural Exhibition Hall (or East Exhibition Hall) covering a floor space of 2500sq.m. This hall is used for Sino-foreign cultural exchange and receiving and showing the quintessence of culture and antiquities from the other provinces and municipal cities of China. Moreover, there are some tributary facilities in the museum such as the Protection Centre of Cultural Relics, Library and Multifunctional Academic Report Hall etc.

The Shaanxi Provincial History Museum is a combined building of the classical Chinese palatial architecture, courtyard architecture and modern architecture, with which makes a very well match the architectural styles of the prosperous Tang Dynasty and the modern architectural styles. The tiles covered on the roof of the museum are the mignonette glazed tiles that popular in Tang Dynasty (A.D.618-907), its walls built with the pastiche asbestos bricks, and the windows installed with the big brown glass and aluminium alloy frames. The whole building looks very Magnificent, massive, elegant and graceful. Under the cover of the trees and the interspersion of the lawns, every corner of the museum seems to permeate through the ancient flavor. It is a grand building!It is an excellent ubication for learning Chinese history and sight-seeing!

Big Wild Goose Pagoda
Big (or Great) Wild Goose Pagoda is located in the Ci’en Temple 4km from the Xi’an downtown. It was built in 652 A.D. designed and supervised by the first master abbot Xuan Zang for keeping the Sanskrit classics and offering sacrifice to the Buddha’s relics and other things that he had taken back from India. Besides, there are two steles with inscriptions by two emperors of Tang Dynasty. Now the epitaphs still can be seen clearly there.

The Big Wild Goose Pagoda is a pavilion-like brick pagoda. It is totally 7 stories, 64.839m in height; the side length of the tower footing is 25m. The pagoda body is quadrate-pyramidal, which is rubbed bricks with tight joints, you can tell apart the bay between two walls by the prisms jutting out on the brick walls. The tower is a very traditional Chinese style architecture if you spiral upwards from the staircases, the ancient city seen from the top of the pagoda is a tremendous spectacle. On the four sides of each story of the pagoda are the arched doors; There are many carving pictures can be seen on the lintels and doorframes of the stone gates on the first floor. They are very valuable, especially, the picture of the Scene of the Monk Preach on the Hall on the lintel of the west stone gate. Also its nearby attractions are very beautiful such as the Lotus Garden of Tang Dynasty, the Northern Square of Big Wild Goose Pagoda, they have attracted many tourists to hand around. The Big Wild Goose Pagoda is one of Landmark Constructions of Xi’an, and it is a must for the tourists.

Small Wild Goose Pagoda
Standing on the Jianfu Temple near the east part of the South Friendship Road and is 3km away from the Big Wild Goose Pagoda. Because the pagoda is lower than the Big Wild Goose, it is called Small Wild Goose. The pagoda had 15 stories before 1556, but the extant is merely 13 stories because its top was destroyed in an earthquake in that year. The foursquare pagoda is 43.3metres high now and each sideline of its base is about11.38meteres. The eaves are jutting out on each story. There are arched doors on both the south and the north sides in each story. On the lintels and the doorcases of the first floor, the vines, grass, flowers and the immortal pictures can be seen carving. There are wood stairs reach to the top of the pagoda, as you stand at there, a beautiful panorama will spread out before you.

In the Jianfu Temple, there is a big ancient iron bell made in 1192, it weighs more than 10,000kg. Every morning, the bell was rung in a definite time and its tolls were so loud and resonant that they could be heard from tens of miles. The Small Wild Goose Pagoda and the Morning Tolls in the temple have become one of the Eight Attractions in the central Shaanxi plain. In recent years, the Shaanxi Folk Custom Museum in the Jianfu Temple has been opened to the public to exhibit the old Shaanxi conditions and customs.

Bell Tower
The Bell Tower was built in 1384 (Ming dynasty), which perches in Xi’an city centre. It stands facing each other with the Drum Tower, and is deemed as one of the landmark constructions and the bright pearl of the ancient city.

The tower was constructed with grey-green bricks and with a square platform. It is 36 meters in total height, covering more than 1377.4sq.m. This half- timbered three-storied construction with the triple dripping eaves and timbered saddle roof (a Chinese architectural style) covered by bottle-green glazed tiles. Outside the entire building is with the colored drawings, but inside the building is with the gold-overlaid colored drawings. Many beautiful pictures were drawn on its girders and many carvings were engraved on its ridgepoles.

The tower has four red big doors. On their leaves, 64 woodcarvings were enchased according to the stories. The carvings’ compositions are very reasonable and dainty. They are fairly exquisite in technique and with very high artistic value. Under each flying eave, a big bell is hung. On top of the tower stands a 6-meter round gold-plating roof crown on a lotiform seat (the Buddha’s seat) with colored glaze. It makes the tower look more grand and magnificent, and reveals the unusual styles of the architectural arts of the Ming Dynasty. Now there is a giant resemblant copper bell hung in the tower. The original bronze one that made in Tang Dynasty has been housed in the Forest of Steles Museum. In the ancient time, it was used to give the correct time at dawn.

Drum Tower
Drum Tower is opposite to the Bell Tower, which has been the important historical and cultural relic under state protection. It was built in 1380 A.D, just the Bell Tower’s elder by four years. The tower is a tall and magnificent architecture with triple dripping eaves and timbered saddle roof (a Chinese architectural style) covered by glazed tiles. With the pendentives and the colored patterns, it looks very statedly and splendid.

As there was ever a giant drum in the first floor (a replacement placed there now) of the tower, the correct time used to be given by beating the drum at dusks. In the former days, there were big plaques hung on the first floor, each weighted about 3 tons. On the third floor, there are 14 red exposed pillars and 24 unexposed pillars supporting the top floor. In the hall there are 3 big palace lanterns, 12 mid-sized lanterns and 16 small-sized palace lanterns hung there. The Drum Tower and the Bell Tower are sister tower and are called together the Morning Bell and Evening Drum in Xi’an. Mounting on the second floor, you can overlook the Mt. Zongnan and a beautiful panorama of Xi’an.

The Great Mosque
The Great Mosque was built in 742 A.D, which is one of the ten famous tourism attractions of Xi’an and situated in the northwest of the Drum Tower. It is an ancient Chinese palatial architectural complex with platforms, pavilions and halls, over 13,000sq.m in size, out of which more than 5,000sq.m are occupied by various structures.

The Great Mosque is rectangular in shape, divided inside into four compounds. A timbered archway which is near the screen wall facing the gate in the front compound will dazzle your eyes when you visit here because it is with upturned angles and flying eaves, painted beans and engraved ridgepoles, and covered with the glazed tiles. It was built in 17th century and approx. 9 meters high. On both sides of it are three wing mansions respectively, where some ancient furniture dating back to the Ming and Qing Dynasties is set out. Passing through the Five-roomed House and entering into the second compound, you will see a stone archway with three doors and four poles stands in its centre. There are four characters carved on the tablet of the frieze of the archway. On its both sides tablets were also carved with four characters. In addition, there are the authentic calligraphic works of two famous calligraphic masters. The style of the calligraphy is very elegantly, written rapidly and powerfully, and the character fonts are very formal. They are the classic of Chinese calligraphy. Westerly about 10 meters a stele carved with a dragon erects on both the south and the north respectively. Further the west is the Chici Hall (Appointing and Granting Hall), there are seven stone steles carved with the Arabic, nastalik and Chinese characters in the hall. In the fourth compound, there is a big hall covering 1,300sq.m, it can accommodate 1,000 for worship and its ceiling bears more than 400 colorful classical Arabic-styled scriptures rilievos.

The Great Mosque is a perfectly wonderful combination of the traditional Chinese architecture and Islamic architecture and is acclaimed as the peak of perfection by the visitors. Therefore, it was listed as one of the famous Islamic cultural relics of the world.

Forest of Steles
Situated in the Shaanxi History Museum and is near the Sanxue Street, which was first built in1087 A.D.

The Forest has collected the oldest and most steles in China. Its eponymy is because there are many steles in this present site. The Forest of Steles comprises 7 large showrooms, 8 verandahs and 8 stele pavilions, and treasures more than 2300 ancient steles and epitaphs of the Han (Western Han and Eastern Han), Wei, Sui, Tang, Song, Yuan, Ming and Qing Dynasties. Now there are over one thousand steles and epitaphs are exhibited, among them, most are chiseled by the chirographers of Tang Dynasty (618-904 A.D.).Here, not only can you appreciate the different calligraphic styles such as the seal characters, square characters, cursive characters and semi-cursive characters etc, you can enjoy the magic penmanship of the great calligraphers such as Ouyang Xun, Yan Zhen-qing, Liu Gong-quan, Wang xi-zhi and Su shi and so on.

Circumvallation of Ming Dynasty
The circumvallation of Ming Dynasty is not only the most well-kept ancient Chinese city wall, but the largest in scale and intact ancient military construction in the world.

The circumvallation was built on the base of the city wall of Sui (581-617A.D.) and Tang Dynasties (618-904A.D.) in the reign of Hongwu (1370-1378A.D.) of Ming Dynasty (1368-1627A.D). This strong and stable construction is 13,912 meters in circumference, 12 meters in height, the fundus is 18 meters in width and the top is 15 meters. The measurement of the wall’s thickness is longer than that of highness. On the city wall, there is a series of military annexes such as the moat, pontlevis, brake gate towers, embrasure watchtowers, main towers, turrets, crenels and city gates etc. They made up of an integrated and air tight city defense system in the age of cold steel. The Circumvallation of Ming Dynasty provides abundant and precious information and human landscape for the visitors who are interested in the ancient wars directly.

Lotus Palace
Lotus Palace (literality is Tang Lotus Garden) is near the Big Goose Tower, which is a largescale royal garden cultural theme park showing the prosperous Tang Dynasty. In Chinese history, this garden is a famous royal garden in ancient China. The present was built in the original site of Tang Dynasty. It is set in approaching history, tasting human culture and experiencing life to unfurl the refulgence of civilization in the piping time of peace in Tang Dynasty. The entire garden is divided into twelve cultural theme sections e.g. monarch, poesy, folk, bite and sup, female, tea culture, religions, diplomacy, science and technology, imperial examinations, songs, dances, and entrance door. They comprehensively resurging the civilization of the Tang Dynasty. In the garden, the pavilions, terraces, towers and many other richly ornamented buildings placing everywhere, including the Violet Mansion, Beauties’ Residence, Imperial Banquet Palace, Fragrant Forest Garden, the Theatre of Phoenixes Screaming in the Ninth Heaven, Apricot Orchard, Luyu Teahouse, Tang Market and so on. Everyday, many performances are on different attractions, such as Dance of Praying for Blessings to the Heaven by Beating the Drums, Musical Dance of the Office in Charge of Imperial Music, Performance in the Palace, the raiment shows, Kungfu performance of Shaolin (Temple), lion performance, stilts performance, and acrobatics etc. Wonderfully, the biggest world fantastic water-screen movies will bring you the frequent shocked tri-dimensional feelings with their musical fountains, lasers, flames, water mines and water spray in the evenings.

Mini China Welcomes You!

 

Is it possible to walk the length and breadth of China within a single day?

One place you could do just that is at the Chinese Ethnic Culture Park, south of the Bird’s Nest and within the Olympic Green.

The huge park has been a labor of love and precisely re-creates life in all 56 of China’s ethnic groups.

From some of the “mountains” or “plateaus,” you can see Beijing’s main Olympic venues, as well as the Three Towers of Dali in Yunnan province, vivid replicas of the Jokhang Temple and many other ethnically significant buildings.

The park covers 45 hectares of land within the North Fourth Ring Road and a leisurely stroll throughout will take six or seven hours. It is also an anthropological museum, the China Nationalities Museum.

When construction started in 1992, it was part of China’s plan to bid for the 2000 Olympics. China lost the bid in 1993, only to win it eight years later for the 2008 Games.

“It is actually a good thing for us, for we had eight more years to do research work for the museum and collect cultural relics from various ethnic groups,” says museum curator Wang Ping.

It took three to five years for the park and museum to prepare the construction of each ethnic group’s area. Although the first phase of the park opened back in 1994, work has been going on non-stop ever since.

“I have done fieldwork in all the ethnic minority regions in China – I have never been to some tourist attractions like the Huangshan Mountain or Taishan Mountain but I have been to many villages around the Himalayan Mountains,” Wang says.

Every ethnic group has a “village” in the park to display its architecture, religion, lifestyle and cultural relics. Various crops are also planted in accordance with different ethnic groups, including paddy rice for the Dong people, highland barley for the Tibetans and buckwheat for the Yi.

“We hope to encourage visitors to enter the lives of different ethnic groups,” says Wang.

Some buildings in the park are original, taken apart at their original spots and then transported to, and reassembled in, Beijing. Others were prepared in the original place and assembled in Beijing.

For example, the symbol of the village of the Salar, a Muslim ethnic group in Northwestern China, is a minaret from the Shangbaizhuang village, Baizhuang township, Xunhua Salar autonomous county, Qinghai province. The minaret was built around 300 years ago, and was moved to the Chinese Ethnic Culture Park in 2003.

In the southern part of the Chinese Ethnic Culture Park, one can visit a replica of the Ermin Tower, an ancient tower in Turpan, Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region. Standing a towering 44 m, it is exactly the same size as the original. The grey-yellow bricks were all made manually in Xinjiang and assembled in Beijing by Uygur craftsmen from Xinjiang.

In the northernmost part of the park, a drum tower, opera stage and “rain and wind bridge” represent the surroundings of a village of the Dong people. A field of paddy rice and ducks and fish in the lake further add to the idyllic atmosphere of the environment.

The park also features live cultural performances. Every morning real lamas from the Tar Monastery of Qinghai province chant Tibetan Buddhist sutras to pray for peace at the Tibetan monastery, while a dongba priest burns incense and says his prayers at the Naxi village.

Then performers of the Miao minority put on a show of “walking on blades”, a traditional Miao stunt, while singers and dancers of other ethnic groups such as the Va, Jingpo and Tu entertain visitors with their program in each village.
Throughout the year, festivals of various ethnic groups are celebrated, including the Tibetan Shotan Festival, the Water-sprinkling Festival of the Dai people and the Torches Festival of the Yi.

“Most minority people are very good at singing and dancing. Participating in their activities helps us understand and respect their cultures more,” says Lei Feng, a 47-year-old visitor to the park.

Liu Li, a 29-year-old visitor, took part in the “bamboo-pole dance” of the Dai people and found in it a long-lost joy like that of the “skipping elastic band” game in her childhood.

“In the past, I had to travel a long way to experience minority people’s lives but now I’ve found it in Beijing,” she says. “Separated only by a wall from the hustle and bustle of the North Fourth Ring Road, it is a totally different world here.”

Wang says that after the outer construction of the Chinese Ethnic Culture Park and China Nationalities Museum is complete, they will still have a lot of work to do, especially in improving the presentation of ethnic culture and enriching collections.

The China Nationalities Museum has so far collected about 100,000 cultural relics of various ethnic groups. Especially valuable among them are 5,000 cultural relics of the Qiang people, housed in a typical watch tower. In the recent earthquake in Sichuan, the Beichuan Qiang autonomous county was badly hit and many cultural relics were ruined.

“Had we not collected these cultural relics, they would probably have been lost forever,” says Wang.
As an anthropological museum, China Nationalities Museum mainly collects items that reflect ordinary people’s lives and on July 15, the museum will open a new exhibition titled Ordinary People’s Exhibition – Our History and Our Root, displaying items such as needles, bowls and pouches.
The preface of the exhibition states: “Most of the production tools and daily utensils of the common people arelost without any trace in history. However, it is these articles that give us a vivid picture of our life and culture they tell us about our history and help us find our roots.”

“What should we present to the world during the Olympic Games? It’s our culture and our people, I believe,” says Wang.

Beijing 2008 Olympic Cities – Shenyang

Shenyang,the largest city in Northeast China, is the political, economic, and cultural center of Liaoning Province. It is also an important industrial base and a famous historical city. As the host city of the 2006 International Horticultural Exposition and venue for the football (soccer) matches of the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games, Shenyang will soon be the focus of world-wide attention.

Shenyang is located in the central part of Liaoning Province. Its climate is relatively dry most of the year with spikes in precipitation during the summer months due to the influence of monsoons. Temperatures vary as much as 10 degrees Celsius from daytime to night, and in winter they can drop below 0 degrees Celsius, so the smart traveler will plan to dress in layers.

Shenyang is a celebrated old city with more than 2,000 years of history which can be traced back to Warring States Period (476 BC – 221 BC). It is the birthplace of the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911), and has many cultural relics which symbolize the prosperity and subsequent decline of Chinas last feudal dynasty… The most famous of these is the Shenyang Imperial Palace,which is of great historic and artistic significance and second only to the Forbidden City in Beijing in the extent of its preservation Fuling Tomb and Zhaoling Tomb are two other famous imperial structures of the Qing Dynasty.

Among the natural wonders of Shenyang the most impressive and unusual is Strange Slope (Guaipo), an anti-gravityslope more than eighty meters (about 87.5 yards) long. Cars and bikes must accelerate to go down the hill but easily roll upward toward the top. Walkers experience a similar reversal in energy required to walk up and down.

As a significant city in Northeast China with abundant resources, Shenyang has made great efforts to provide good lodging, dining, transportation and recreation for tourists from all over the world. Altogether there are five five-star hotels in Shenyang, and the service and facilities of the other star-rated hotels in the city are all good enough to make you feel at home. In addition, you can find less expensive accommodations at local universities and hostels.

Famous traditional dishes and snacks in Shenyang will definitely make your mouth water. And there are plenty of pubs, KTVs (karaoke bars), cafes, and tea houses available to meet your food and entertainment needs A visit to Shenyang can be both entertaining and relaxing.